Vigilante
by Captain Zangano
Summary: After a terrible mistake with the Death Note, Light has a change of heart and attempts to make up for past wrongs in his own twisted way.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** I don't own either Death Note or Batman. (And Batman fans have my deepest apologies for the existence of this fic D: )

**A/N:** For the RLt Fall Event Cross-over prompt. I missed the deadline on this one. Whoops. But I decided to work on it anyway.

**Warning:** Major Character Death

* * *

It was dark in the room, and Light's hands worked furiously, lit only by the soft glow from the monitor.

"Just one more name for today, Ryuk," Light muttered as he yawned and stretched. It was a taxing job: cleansing the world of criminals while evading the World's Greatest Detective, and keeping up the façade of being the perfect son, brother, and future college student all at the same time. Light gently massaged his cramping hand and wondered if the world would ever appreciate all that he had sacrificed. It would be nice if people would sing his praises one day, but for now, altruism was its own reward.

Suddenly there was a pounding on his door. "Light! Are you in there?" The door handle jiggled. "Hey why's the door locked?"

Light closed the notebook, flicked off his monitor and crossed the room to unlock and open the door a crack. "Sayu, what is it?" Normally Light had more patience for his sister's antics, but lately he'd been rather preoccupied with outsmarting L.

"You promised to take me to Spaceland today, and it's already – hey, why's it so dark in your room?"

Crap. He had forgotten about Spaceland. "Just give me fifteen more minutes to get ready, Sayu."

"Okay, but you better hurry or I'll tell mom about your secret porn stash."

Light felt his eye twitch. At least she hadn't stumbled across the Death Note. "Sayu, you shouldn't go through my stuff-"

"Most of it was boring anyway!" Sayu laughed as she ran down the hall. "Don't forget, fifteen minutes!" Then she stomped excitedly down the stairs.

Light locked the door and moved to clean up his desk, then paused. He hated leaving work unfinished. "Just one more name," he mumbled.

He switched the channel to the international news station. In the United States, a man recently accused of murder had just bailed himself out. The bond had been set at 20 million dollars. Light frowned, and did a quick Google search of the name. Not only was the man filthy rich, but he was an obnoxious playboy who never did anything useful or productive. He seemed like the kind of guy who would be able to buy his way out of a prison sentence too. Light raised his hand to write the name.

"And so all that money goes to his relatives, who are probably just as lazy as he is." Light never had any ambitions of profiting from the Death Note - but what if he could? Didn't Kira deserve a reward for being so selfless in improving the world? And it wasn't like he'd use all the money for himself either. He'd put it to good use. Surely.

"Heh, heh, what are you planning, Light?" Ryuk asked. "You know if you write your own name in the Death Note, you'll die too."

Light shot an annoyed glance at the Shinigami. "Obviously I've already thought of that, Ryuk." He leaned forward and stared at the man on the screen. "Hmm, do you think he'd make out a blank will and leave it in a safe deposit box, Ryuk?"

"Oh, I've never tried anything like that."

"He's really rich, maybe I could control him into forging information about a long-lost relative. Hmm." Light sat there in contemplation. "Or I could have him mail all his relevant personal information to a post office box, and then have the contents of the post office box sent here, and then I could figure it out from there." Light wasn't a genius for nothing, and he was sure he could figure out a way to profit with only minimal information. "Of course I'd have to kill him in a non-suspicious way, maybe a drug overdose."

Only after carefully planning out the intricate details of the man's death did Light write his name and time of death in the Death Note. Then he relaxed back into his chair with a contented sigh. Yes, the world would be a much better place without useless playboys and murder suspects like _Bruce Wayne._


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** I still don't own Death Note, Justice League, or Batman.

**A/N: ** Thanks for reading!

* * *

Light was locked in his room, starting on another round of eliminating criminals when the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it!" Sayu shouted and ran down the stairs.

Light winced as her heavy footfalls hit the stairs like a herd of elephants. Thump! Thump! Thump! He tried to concentrate on writing names again.

"Light! Did you order something? Do you want me to open it for you? If you don't come down here now, I'll assume you mean yes!"

A package? That could only mean one thing. Well, there were several possibilities. Maybe L had taken to sending him messages through the post office. Though most likely Bruce Wayne's financial information had been forwarded to him. Light pushed himself away from his desk and ran down the stairs before Sayu could open the package as threatened.

Sayu was shaking the plain brown medium-sized package and holding it up to her ear. "What's inside? I think I can hear something clanking around in there."

Light winced. As much as he liked his younger sister, she could be intensely aggravating at times. "Thank you for answering the door, Sayu," he said as politely as he could manage. "Now can you give me my package?"

"Mom! Light ordered a package online and he won't let me see what's inside!"

"Sayu, leave your brother alone," Sachiko yelled from the kitchen.

"Why do you always take his side?" She shook the box again. "What is it, porn?"

Light reached out and grabbed the package from her hands. "Of course not, Sayu, it's paperwork for college. You'd probably find it incredibly boring."

"Then why won't you open it right now and let us see?"

The brief mention of college caught Sachiko's attention. "You got a package from school, Light? Does it have anything to do with your perfect entrance exam scores?"

Light felt a tension headache coming on. "I don't know what it is yet, and I'd rather not say anything until I look at it."

Sayu pouted. "You're such a spoilsport."

"Okay, Light. But let us know soon, if it's good news. Sayu, why don't you help me prepare dinner?"

"But mom~" And Sayu pouted the pout of the younger sibling who never got to do the fun exciting stuff like her older brother.

Light swiftly retreated back to his room and locked the door. "It worked," he whispered. After all this time of wondering, he had not only eliminated a sleazy good-for-nothing, but set himself up to financially profit as well. Maybe he could level the financial playing field between Kira and L. That would be a move the reclusive detective would never expect.

"Well, let's see what kind of man you were, Bruce Wayne," Light said to himself as he cut the packing tape, and pulled the box open.

There was a manila envelope on top, with lists of Bruce Wayne's accounts and properties inside. Underneath was a key with a bat-shaped card attached. Light frowned and dug through the box. There was another bat-shaped key, and a letter explaining how to take over Bruce Wayne's duties with a giant batman logo on the letterhead.

Light felt the blood drain out of his face as realization dawned on him.

"Ryuk, did I…was Bruce Wayne-"

Ryuk laughed. "I guess you weren't expecting Bruce Wayne to have such an interesting nighttime hobby, huh Light?"

Light turned the bat-shaped key around in his hand while sorted through the photos and codes in the rest of the package. Batman had always been one of his heroes. The caped crusader and the way he made the criminals cower in fear had always inspired him as a young kid. Batman stood for justice, he was fearless, and took down the bad guys other were afraid to touch. Batman was one of the good guys. Kira only killed bad people. And yet-

"Ryuk…I killed Batman."

-x-

* * *

Light spent the rest of the afternoon mulling over his new discovery. Obviously he couldn't just use Bruce Wayne's money to fight L, no, his plans had changed.

If anything, this mistake exposed one of Kira's weaknesses. "Ryuk, I'm too dependent on the media for Kira's judgments. I barely know anything about the people I kill."

"What? That never bothered you before."

"What if I'm accidentally killing good people too? I need to find a way to make up for killing Batman, and get more reliable information on criminals before Kira judges them."

The world needed Batman. The world still needed Kira, but maybe a slightly different version of Kira. Light had all Bruce Wayne's information, and could easily take over as "Batman" in order to prevent criminals from getting out of hand. But would impersonating Batman really make up for killing him? Light finally decided that at least taking action was better than doing nothing.

"Ryuk, do you want to make a trip to Gotham City?"

Ryuk twisted himself into a pretzel on the ceiling. "Oh, that sounds like fun, do I get to ride in the Batmobile?"

"Hnn, we'll see about that."

Now he just had to come up with a convincing and completely unsuspicious excuse for leaving the country. Light looked up the location of Gotham City. Yes, there was a way it could work. Light busied himself setting up the necessary paperwork.

* * *

-x-

Light decided to make the announcement to his family that night at dinner.

"Mom, Dad, Sayu, I won't be going to Todai University next month."

They all gasped.

"But Light, your exam scores were perfect! What happened to change your mind?"

His father was half-way out of his chair, leaning over the table in an instant. "Son! You can't be serious! What are you doing?"

Sayu frowned. "Hey, does this have anything to do with the package you got today?"

Light smirked and chuckled. "Sayu's right. I won't be going to Todai, because I received a full scholarship to attend Princeton in the United States. I didn't want to mention it before, until I was absolutely sure I was accepted into the program."

His parents both stared at him open-mouthed for a moment of silence.

Finally his mother recovered from the shock. "Full scholarship? That's wonderful, Light." She paused to mull over the news. "But you'll be so far away from home."

His father sighed and sat back down in his chair. "Are you sure this is what you want to do? Todai has a very good criminal justice program."

"I've thought about that," Light said. "But this is just too good of an opportunity to pass up."

"I won't be starting until the fall, because the school year starts at a different time in the U.S., but the organization providing the scholarship wants me to move to New Jersey in the next few weeks, so I can have time to learn the area and perfect my English before classes start."

"Can I visit you? Huh? Hey, maybe you can take me with you."

"You'll have to study harder in English if you want to visit, Sayu."

"Hey, no fair!"

* * *

-x-

Light set up a few weeks worth of judgments and booked a plane ticket for Gotham City. The sooner he was away from L, the better.


End file.
